I have only been using Twitter regularly for about a month. While I am totally enjoying it, this article on Adage.com brings me to a crossroads on where I feel Twitter fits in. Right now I have about 75 friends on Facebook and about 50/140 (Following/Followers) on Twitter. The interesting thing about them? They are mutually exclusive. I don’t follow anyone on Twitter that I communicate with on Facebook and vice-versa, with exception of two Channel-Flippers. (Great web video!) Why is that? Because with little exception, I don’t know anyone on Twitter personally and know everyone on Facebook on a personal level. I am not sure I am a representative user of either service, but I use Facebook for friends and family and Twitter for blog and business.
I post photos of my wife and son, I wall talk with my mom, things that have no business publicly broadcast on Twitter. The same goes for Twitter, I am sure that my last Tweet “philoking: someone give me a twitterific way to give away one of the cool retro MS-DOS shirts….” is of very little interest to my sister or cousins.
I think that it’s this type of segregation that will be the defining line between the two services. I sincerely hope that Facebook doesn’t go too far into the weeds trying to define delicate privacy settings that have group/user access and become way to cumbersome. While I am sure Facebook want’s Twitter’s market, I love that I can use two services and not have to worry, even to the point that I can link my Status messages together. Currently my straight status messages go to Facebook but replies do not and that’s a great compromise for me.
Facebook is full of “look at my cat” (guilty) and I just stumped my toe kind of stuff, which is the fastest way to get un-followed by me on Twitter. Those types of posts have sentimental value when they come from your sister, but they aren’t very interesting coming from a stranger.
Now if LinkedIn takes a stab at Twitter, that might be interesting, unfortunately for them, I think it’s probably too late.
Tweet
Jason,
For the most part I’m in the same boat. The only overlap I have is with a few local friends and a few marketing associations. But I spend maybe an hour or two a week on Facebook, while I spend the majority of my day dipping in and out of Twitter.
The only potential threat I see is when more and more Facebook people join Twitter (which they are). You can only split your attention so many ways. I honestly think that long term Twitter is a threat to Facebook only because it pulls away Facebook’s “face-time” which drives their ad revenues.